After about an hour of fiddling with various dependencies, I found that adding

=virtual/jdk-1.7.0

to /etc/portage/package.mask solved the problem for now. (I'm trying to keep Oracle Java out of my system).

A little further poking around showed that by adding:

dev-java/icedtea-bin ~x86
(or I could have unmasked dev-java/icedtea and accomplished my goal)

to my /etc/portage/package.keywords files and removing =virtual/jdk-1.7.0 from package.mask allowed virtual/jdk-1.7.0 to be installed along with upgrading to ~dev-java/icedtea-bin-7.2.3.3-r1 in a new slot along with stable 6.1.11.5-r1.

This is what I'm doing right now. I think a little more guru guidance would have been helpful. Corrective advice would also be appreciated._________________Andy Figueroa
andy@andyfigueroa.net Working with Unix since 1983.

Andy, you gave me the advice I needed; thanks ..._________________.... there is nothing - absolutely nothing - half so much worth
doing as simply messing about with Linux ...
(apologies to Kenneth Graeme)